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Nov. 7 (UPI) — Republicans narrowly defeated a bipartisan bill in the Senate requiring congressional approval for military action against Venezuela as the Trump administration continues a military buildup in the region and attacks on alleged drug boats in nearby waters.

The GOP lawmakers rejected Senate Joint Resolution 90 in a 51-49 vote on Thursday evening, with Republican Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska casting ballots in favor of the measure with their Democratic colleagues.

The resolution was introduced by Paul, and Democratic Sens. Adam Schiff of California and Tim Kaine of Virginia in response to reporting that President Donald Trump was considering military ground strikes against Venezuela.

Venezuela has long been a target of Trump, who, during his first administration, launched a failed multiyear pressure campaign to oust its authoritarian leader, President Nicolas Maduro.

Since returning to the White House in January, Trump has used his executive powers to target drug cartels, including the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang. Trump has claimed, without providing evidence, that TdA has “invaded” the United States at Maduro’s direction, despite his own National Intelligence Council concluding in May that the regime “probably does not have a policy of cooperating” with TdA.

The vote was held as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced a 17th known military strike on an alleged drug trafficking boat in Caribbean international waters. Since Sept. 2, the United States has killed around 70 people in the attacks.

The attacks have drawn domestic and international criticism and allegations of war crimes, murder and extrajudicial killings. Some Democrats called on the Trump administration to answer questions over the legality of the strikes without gaining proper congressional approval.

Following the Thursday vote, Kaine said the Trump administration told some members of Congress that it lacked legal authority to launch any attacks into Venezuela. Some worry that an attack could devolve into a full-scale war.

“Trump’s illegal strikes on boats in the Caribbean and threats of land strikes in Venezuela recklessly and unnecessarily put the U.S. at risk of war,” Kaine said in a statement.

In a separate statement, he criticized his Republican colleagues, stating: “If the U.S. is going to put our nation’s sons and daughters into harm’s way, then we should have a robust debate in Congress in front of the American people.”

Sen. Todd Young, a Republican of Indiana, voted against the bill on Thursday, and explained in a statement that he has been informed of the legal rationale behind the strikes and does not believe the resolution is appropriate right now, but that could change.

“My vote is not an endorsement of the administration’s current course in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific. As a matter of policy, I am troubled by many aspects and assumptions of this operation and believe it is at odds with the majority of Americans who want the U.S. military less entangled in international conflicts,” he said.

CHICAGO — An appeals court intervened Wednesday and suddenly blocked an order that required a senior Border Patrol official to give unprecedented daily briefings to a judge about immigration sweeps in Chicago.

The one-page suspension by the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals came before Greg Bovino’s first scheduled, late afternoon meeting with U.S. District Judge Sara Ellis at the courthouse in downtown Chicago.

Ellis had ordered the meetings Tuesday after weeks of tense encounters and increasingly aggressive tactics by government agents working Operation Midway Blitz. It has produced more than 1,800 arrests and complaints of excessive force.

Bovino told Fox News that he was eager to talk to Ellis. But government lawyers, at the same time, were appealing her decision. Lawyers for news outlets and activists who say agents have used too much force, including tear gas, have until 5 p.m. Thursday to respond in the appeals court.

Ellis’ order followed enforcement actions in which tear gas was used, including in a neighborhood where children had gathered for a Halloween parade last weekend on the city’s Northwest Side. Neighbors had joined in the street as someone was arrested.

“Halloween is on Friday,” she said. “I do not want to get violation reports from the plaintiffs that show that agents are out and about on Halloween, where kids are present and tear gas is being deployed.”

Bovino defended agents’ actions.

“If she wants to meet with me every day, then she’s going to see, she’s going to have a very good firsthand look at just how bad things really are on the streets of Chicago,” Bovino told Fox News. “I look forward to meeting with that judge to show her exactly what’s happening and the extreme amount of violence perpetrated against law enforcement here.”

Meanwhile, prosecutors filed charges against Kat Abughazaleh, a Democratic congressional candidate, and five other people over protests at an immigration enforcement building in Broadview, outside Chicago. The indictment, unsealed Wednesday, alleges they illegally blocked an agent’s car on Sept. 26.

Abughazaleh said the prosecution was an “attempt to silence dissent.”

The Chicago court actions came as groups and officials across the country have filed lawsuits aimed at restricting federal deployments of National Guard troops.

President Trump’s administration will remain blocked from deploying troops in the Chicago area until at least the latter half of November, following a U.S. Supreme Court order Wednesday calling on the parties to file additional legal briefs.

The justices indicated they would not act before Nov. 17 on the administration’s emergency appeal to overturn a lower-court ruling that has blocked the troop deployments.

In Portland, Ore., a federal trial seeking to block a troop deployment got underway Wednesday morning with a police commander describing on the witness stand how federal agents at a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building repeatedly fired tear gas at nonviolent protesters.

In Chicago, Bovino, who is chief of the Border Patrol sector in El Centro, Calif., was to sit for a daily 5:45 p.m. briefing to report how his agents are enforcing the law and whether they are staying within constitutional bounds, Ellis said. The check-ins were to take place until a Nov. 5 hearing.

Ellis also demanded that Bovino produce all use-of-force reports since Sept. 2 from agents involved in Operation Midway Blitz.

The judge expressed confidence Tuesday that the check-ins would prevent excessive use of force in Chicago neighborhoods.

Ellis previously ordered agents to wear badges, and she has banned them from using certain riot control techniques against peaceful protesters and journalists. She subsequently required body cameras after the use of tear gas raised concerns that agents were not following her initial order.

Ellis set a Friday deadline for Bovino to get a camera and to complete training.

Lawyers for the government have repeatedly defended the actions of agents, including those from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and told the judge that videos and other portrayals of enforcement actions have been one-sided.

Besides his court appearance, Bovino still must sit for a videotaped Thursday deposition, an interview in private, with lawyers from both sides.

Fernando writes for the Associated Press.

The Pentagon says it will require credentialed journalists at the military headquarters to sign a pledge to refrain from reporting information that has not been authorized for release — including unclassified information.

Journalists who don’t abide by the policy risk losing credentials that provide access to the Pentagon, under a 17-page memo distributed Friday that steps up media restrictions imposed by the administration of President Trump.

“Information must be approved for public release by an appropriate authorizing official before it is released, even if it is unclassified,” the directive states. The signature form includes an array of security requirements for credentialed media at the Defense Department, which Trump has moved to rename the War Department.

Advocates for press freedoms denounced the nondisclosure requirement as an assault on independent journalism. The new Pentagon restrictions arrive as Trump expands threats, lawsuits and government pressure as he remakes the American media landscape.

“If the news about our military must first be approved by the government, then the public is no longer getting independent reporting. It is getting only what officials want them to see,” said National Press Club President Mike Balsamo, also national law enforcement editor at the Associated Press. “That should alarm every American.”

No more permission to ‘roam the halls’

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, a former Fox News Channel personality, highlighted the restrictions in a social media post on X.

“The ‘press’ does not run the Pentagon — the people do. The press is no longer allowed to roam the halls of a secure facility,” Hegseth said. “Wear a badge and follow the rules — or go home.”

The Pentagon this year has evicted many news organizations while imposing a series of restrictions that include banning reporters from entering wide areas of the complex without a government escort — areas where the press had access in past administrations as it covers the activities of the world’s most powerful military.

The Pentagon was embarrassed early in Hegseth’s tenure when the editor in chief of the Atlantic, Jeffrey Goldberg, was inadvertently included in a group chat on the Signal messaging app where the Defense secretary discussed plans for upcoming military strikes in Yemen. Trump’s then-national security advisor, Mike Waltz, took responsibility for Goldberg being included and was shifted to another job.

The Defense Department also was embarrassed by a leak to the New York Times that billionaire Elon Musk was to get a briefing on the U.S. military’s plans in case a war broke out with China. That briefing never took place, on Trump’s orders, and Hegseth suspended two Pentagon officials as part of an investigation into how that news got out.

On Saturday, the Society of Professional Journalists also objected to the Pentagon’s move, calling it “alarming.”

“This policy reeks of prior restraint — the most egregious violation of press freedom under the First Amendment — and is a dangerous step toward government censorship,” it said in a statement Saturday. “Attempts to silence the press under the guise of ‘security’ are part of a disturbing pattern of growing government hostility toward transparency and democratic norms.”

And Matt Murray, executive editor of the Washington Post, said in the paper Saturday that the new policy runs counter to what’s good for the American public.

“The Constitution protects the right to report on the activities of democratically elected and appointed government officials,” Murray said. “Any attempt to control messaging and curb access by the government is counter to the First Amendment and against the public interest.”

Lee writes for the Associated Press.

A United States federal judge has granted a temporary block against a Texas law that would require the Ten Commandments from the Christian Bible to be displayed in the classrooms of every public school.

On Wednesday, US District Judge Fred Biery issued a preliminary injunction against Texas’s Senate Bill 10, which was slated to take effect on September 1.

Texas would have become the largest state to impose such a requirement on public schools.

But Judge Biery’s decision falls in line with two other court decisions over the past month: one in Arkansas and one in Louisiana, both of which ruled such laws are unconstitutional.

Biery’s decision opens by citing the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which bars the government from passing laws “respecting an establishment of religion”. That clause underpins the separation of church and state in the US.

The judge then argues that even “passive” displays of the Ten Commandments would risk injecting religious discourse into the classroom, thereby violating that separation.

“Even though the Ten Commandments would not be affirmatively taught, the captive audience of students likely would have questions, which teachers would feel compelled to answer. That is what they do,” Biery wrote.

“Teenage boys, being the curious hormonally driven creatures they are, might ask: ‘Mrs Walker, I know about lying and I love my parents, but how do I do adultery?’ Truly an awkward moment for overworked and underpaid educators, who already have to deal with sex education issues.”

Biery’s decision, however, only applies to the 11 school districts represented among the defendants, including Alamo Heights, Houston, Austin, Fort Bend and Plano.

The case stemmed from a complaint made by several parents of school-aged children, who were represented by groups including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

One of the plaintiffs was a San Antonio rabbi, Mara Nathan, who felt the version of the Ten Commandments slated to be displayed ran contrary to Jewish teachings. She applauded Wednesday’s injunction in a statement released by the ACLU.

“Children’s religious beliefs should be instilled by parents and faith communities, not politicians and public schools,” Nathan said.

Other plaintiffs included Christian families who feared the schoolhouse displays of the Ten Commandments would lead to the teaching of religious interpretations and concepts they might object to.

The Texas state government, however, has argued that the Ten Commandments symbolise an important part of US culture and therefore should be a mandatory presence in schools.

“The Ten Commandments are a cornerstone of our moral and legal heritage, and their presence in classrooms serves as a reminder of the values that guide responsible citizenship,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement. He pledged to appeal Wednesday’s ruling.

But in his 55-page decision, Judge Biery, who was appointed by Democratic President Bill Clinton in 1994, drew on a range of cultural references – from Christian scripture to the 1970s pop duo Sonny and Cher and the actress Greta Garbo – to sketch a history of the dangers of imposing religion on the public.

“The displays are likely to pressure the child-Plaintiffs into religious observance, meditation on, veneration, and adoption of the State’s favored religious scripture,” Biery wrote at one point.

He also said such displays risk “suppressing expression of [the children’s] own religious or nonreligious backgrounds and beliefs while at school”.

Biery even offered a winking, personal anecdote to illustrate the power that governments can hold over the adoption of religion.

“Indeed, forty years ago a Methodist preacher told a then much younger judge, ‘Fred, if you had been born in Tibet, you would be a Buddhist,’” Biery wrote.

A separate federal case involving Dallas area schools is also challenging the Ten Commandment requirement. It names the Texas Education Agency as a defendant.

Such cases are likely to eventually reach the Supreme Court, which currently has a six-to-three conservative supermajority and has shown sympathy for cases of religious displays.

In the 2022 case Kennedy v Bremerton School District, for instance, the Supreme Court sided with a high school football coach who argued he had the right to hold post-game prayers, despite fears that such practices could violate the First Amendment. The coach had been fired for his actions.

Judge Biery concluded Wednesday’s decision with a nod to how controversial such cases can be. But he appealed for common understanding with a prayer-like flourish.

“For those who disagree with the Court’s decision and who would do so with threats, vulgarities and violence, Grace and Peace unto you,” Biery wrote. “May humankind of all faiths, beliefs and non-beliefs be reconciled one to another. Amen.”

The complaint alleges that a law requiring the religious text violates ‘fundamental religious-freedom principles’ in the US.

A group of faith leaders in the United States have filed a lawsuit seeking to block the state of Texas from requiring the Ten Commandments, as detailed in the Old Testament of the Bible, to be displayed in public classrooms.

Their legal challenge on Tuesday comes just days after Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed the legislation, which would make Texas the largest state in the country to impose such a requirement.

In the lawsuit, the Christian and Muslim faith leaders argue that the law would subject nearly six million students across Texas’s 9,100 public schools to “religious mandates, every single school day”.

“This is wholly inconsistent with the fundamental religious-freedom principles … upon which our nation was founded,” said the lawsuit.

It further noted that children who attend public schools in Texas “follow various faiths and religions, or do not practice any religion at all”.

The US Constitution protects the right to practice — or not practice — a religion without interference from the government.

Meanwhile, the concept of the “separation of church and state” has long been seen as a bedrock principle in US law. While it is not directly referred to in the US Constitution, its roots have been traced back to the US colonial period.

Thomas Jefferson, the country’s third president, used the phrase to discuss the Constitution’s Establishment Clause, which prohibits the government from making laws “respecting an establishment of religion”. The concept has also been upheld by several Supreme Court rulings.

Still, a handful of conservative-led states have sought to pass laws mixing public education with elements from the Christian religion.

In 2024, Louisiana became the first state in the US to mandate displaying of the Ten Commandments in public schools. Last week, a federal appeals court blocked the requirement.

Arkansas also passed a similar law in April, which several groups say they plan to challenge.

Proponents of those kinds of laws argue that the Ten Commandments have historical significance beyond their religious context and are foundational to US society.

A sponsor of the Texas bill, Candy Noble, said the requirement to show the Ten Commandments concerns “what is historically important to our nation educationally and judicially”.

In Biblical narrative, the Ten Commandments were scrolled on two stone tablets and given to Moses by God on Mount Sinai. Moses was then given the instruction to spread the teaching.

The commandments include rules such as “Thou shall not kill” and “Thou shall not steal”, as well as prohibitions against other gods, taking “the Lord’s name in vain” and not honouring the Sabbath day.

The Texas law requires public schools to display a poster or framed copy of an English version of the commandments, which should be no smaller than 16 by 20 inches or 41 by 51 centimetres.

Translations and interpretations, however, vary across denominations, faiths and languages and may differ in homes and houses of worship.

Several other groups have also vowed to challenge the law. They include the American Civil Liberties Union of Texas, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Americans United for Separation of Church and State, and the Freedom From Religion Foundation.

In a statement in May, the groups said the law “is religiously coercive and interferes with families’ right to direct children’s religious education”.

NEW ORLEANS — A panel of three federal appellate judges has ruled that a Louisiana law requiring the Ten Commandments to be posted in each of the state’s public school classrooms is unconstitutional.

The ruling Friday marked a major win for civil liberties groups who say the mandate violates the separation of church and state, and that the poster-sized displays would isolate students — especially those who are not Christian.

The mandate has been touted by Republicans, including President Trump, and marks one of the latest pushes by conservatives to incorporate religion into classrooms. Backers of the law argue the Ten Commandments belong in classrooms because they are historical and part of the foundation of U.S. law.

The plaintiffs’ attorneys and Louisiana disagreed on whether the appeals court’s decision applied to every public school district in the state or only the districts party to the lawsuit.

“All school districts in the state are bound to comply with the U.S. Constitution,” said Liz Hayes, a spokesperson for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which served as co-counsel for the plaintiffs.

The appeals court’s rulings “interpret the law for all of Louisiana,” Hayes added. “Thus, all school districts must abide by this decision and should not post the Ten Commandments in their classrooms.”

Louisiana Atty. Gen. Liz Murrill said she disagreed and believed the ruling applied only to school districts in the five parishes that were party to the lawsuit and that she would seek to appeal the ruling.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ order stems from a lawsuit filed last year by parents of Louisiana schoolchildren from various religious backgrounds, who said the law violates 1st Amendment language guaranteeing religious liberty and forbidding government establishment of religion.

The mandate was signed into law last June by Republican Gov. Jeff Landry.

The court’s ruling backs an order issued last fall by U.S. District Judge John deGravelles, who declared the mandate unconstitutional and ordered state education officials not to take steps to enforce it and to notify all local school boards in the state of his decision.

Law experts have long said they expect the Louisiana case to make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court, testing the conservative court on the issue of religion and government.

In 1980, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a similar Kentucky law violated the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution, which says Congress can “make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” The high court found that the law had no secular purpose but served a plainly religious purpose.

In 2005, the Supreme Court held that such displays in a pair of Kentucky courthouses violated the Constitution. At the same time, the court upheld a Ten Commandments marker on the grounds of the Texas state Capitol in Austin.

Cline and Brook write for the Associated Press.

SALT LAKE CITY, May 22 (UPI) — A new Washington state law that requires members of the clergy to report child abuse or neglect, including when the information is revealed in confession, is being investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division.

The DOJ claims the law is anti-Catholic and appears on its face to violate the First Amendment. The investigation, which was announced earlier this month, will look at the development and passage of Senate Bill 5375.

The bill, which adds clergy members to the list of mandatory reporters, was passed by the Senate in a 28-20 vote and 64-31 by the House. It was signed into law May 2 by Gov. Bob Ferguson and is to go into effect July 27.

A DOJ news release says the law has no exception for the absolute seal of confidentiality that applies to Catholic priests.

“SB 5375 demands that Catholic Priests violate their deeply held faith in order to obey the law, a violation of the Constitution and a breach of the free exercise of religion cannot stand under our Constitutional system of government,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon said in the release.

“Worse, the law appears to single out clergy as not entitled to assert applicable privileges, as compared to other reporting professionals,” Dhillon said.

The bill’s sponsor, Sen. Noel Frame, D-Seattle, disputes those claims and said the law is not anti-Catholic. She pointed out that members of the clergy are defined as a licensed, accredited or ordained minister, priest, rabbi, imam, elder or similarly situated religious or spiritual leader of any church, religious denomination, religious body, spiritual community or sect.

Mandated reporters include law enforcement officers, professional school personnel, social service counselors, nurses, psychologists and licensed childcare providers, among others. If they have reasonable cause to believe a child has suffered abuse or neglect, they are required to report that to law enforcement or the Department of Children, Youth, and Families.

Under the new law, clergy members must report abuse, but cannot be compelled to testify against the penitent in a court case or criminal proceedings.

“We are talking in our case here about really simply just the reporting in real time of known or suspected abuse and neglect of children in real time,” Frame said. “We’re simply saying, if you believe or you know that a child is actively being abused or neglected, call it in so we can go check on that child to make sure that they are safe.”

Archbishop Paul Etienne of the Archdiocese of Seattle descibted the the law as government overreach. After the apostles were thrown into jail for preaching in the name of Jesus Christ, St. Peter responded, “We must obey God rather than men,” he said in a written statement.

“This is our stance now in the face of this new law,” Etienne said. “Catholic clergy may not violate the seal of confession — or they will be excommunicated from the Church. All Catholics must know and be assured that their confessions remain sacred, secure, confidential and protected by the law of the church.”

The Catholic Church in the United States has been reporting incidents of abuse to law enforcement and cooperating with civil authorities for decades, according to Etienne. Those efforts began in 1986 in the Seattle Archdiocese, he said.

“Our policies already require priests to be mandatory reporters, but not if this information is obtained during confession,” Etienne said.

Frame countered that voluntarily complying with part of the law does not make priests mandatory reporters.

“They may be if they are a teacher, for instance, but they are not mandatory reporters in their role as clergy,” she said. “And to say that we’re already mandated reporters has caused great confusion such that people think the only point of this bill was to ‘go after confession.’ Not true.”

The senator has been trying since 2022 to pass legislation to make clergy mandatory reporters. Articles by Investigative West about how a Jehovah’s Witnesses community in Washington allegedly was covering up sexual abuse of children spurred her effort.

The nonprofit news organization reported the community was handling complaints internally and abuse was not being addressed.

Frame, a survivor of childhood sexual abuse by a family member from ages 5 to 10, said children need to know that if they ask a trusted adult such as a faith leader for help, they’ll get it.

“I told the mandated reporter about the abuse and that’s how it was stopped, and that was my teacher,” she said.

The Freedom From Religion Foundation, which advocated for passage of SB 5375 through its FFRF Action Fund lobbying arm, said the law closes a longstanding and dangerous loophole that allowed clergy to withhold information about child abuse.

“FFRF urges the DOJ to immediately drop this politically motivated and legally unsound investigation,” the organization said in a news release. “Protecting children from harm must be a priority that transcends religious boundaries. It is not anti-Christian to hold clergy accountable — it is pro-child, pro-justice and pro-human rights.”

Other states that do not have an exemption for penitential communication as of May 2023 are New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas and West Virginia, according to the Child Welfare Information Gateway.

The Utah Legislature passed a bill last year that does not make clergy mandated reporters, but protects them from civil and criminal liability if they report ongoing abuse or neglect even if the information came from a penitent during confession.

Utah Rep. Anthony Loubet, R-Kearns, said he sponsored House Bill 432 after constituents reached out to him. Some religious organizations had implemented their own reporting requirements, but the protection from liability applied only to mandated reporters, which did not include clergy, he said.

Members of the clergy like having this option, Loubet said.

“This made it clear that they could report if they wanted to and if they did, they received the protection,” he said.